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Steven Pringle (guest)
IL:

It has been clear from the very beginning, that no matter what, the republicans were not going to do anything to reform health care. They have done everything they could think of to stop health care reform. In spite of that democrats have allowed many of the republican ideas into the bills that passed. They have lied, demonized the bills and denied any benefits the American public will derive from health care reform and insisted that the whole bill be thrown out so that they can run the government with their substantial minority. If someone is trying to kill you, you don't offer them coffee. This bill should have been passed last summer without republicans who don't want health care reform at all. This nonsense about "there must be bipartisanship" on major legislation is garbage. The republican party has never been so anti-bipartisanship in all of its history. If the democrats proposed a resolution supporting the Sun rising in the morning, the republicans would oppose it. If republicans want bipartisanship, they should get down on their knees and beg for it. They should show exactly what it is that they are willing to compromise on. So far, they have shown nothing but contempt for "bipartisanship." Thugs deserve tough love.

Matt Caci (guest)
MA:

The virtue of bipartisanship assumes that both parties bring good ideas to the table and both parties are truly concerned with solving the problem at hand. But is bipartisanship really so imperative when one party is not concerned with solving problems but rather scoring political points? Another aspect of bipartisanship is content vs. votes. If suggestions from both parties are included in the final bill, is that bill bipartisan? Or does the bill only become bipartisan once it is voted on by members of both parties? If the answer is the latter and not the former, how many votes from each party does it take to be bipartisan? Is 59 Dem votes and 1 Rep vote bipartisan?

William Jahn (guest)
CA:

The Democrats ultimate goal is a single payer health care system. Once a critical mass is reached of those dependent upon government for their employment, the United States will be fundamentally changed to a country that has abandoned its freedom in exchange for the false promise of security. Defeating this legislation is only a first step. Excising creeping progressivism from political cancers in both parties takes eternal vigilance and many election cycles.
I have no financial or job-related stake in the outcome.

Randy Minton (guest)
GA:

The Democrats are like spoiled children. When parents tell a spoiled child NO!, the child asks the question in a different way. Spoiled children do this over and over until they finally get the answer they are looking for. That is exactly what has happened here. In the old days before spoiled children ruled the world, this sort of behavior would be punished in the barn in back of the house. The parent would come out of the barn sweating from the exertion, and the child would come out with an understanding of who was actually in charge. But that was then, and this is now. This group of spoiled children have worn down most of America to the point where they are saying, "Screw it. If it will get you to finally shut up and start focusing on jobs again, do what you want." What the American people may not know is that that jobs are far down the Democrats' list of things to do after immigration reform, climate change reform, financial reform, student loan reform, and the reform needed to reform all of the new reforms. These spoiled children will not be satisfied until the collective wallets of mom and dad are completely empty, at which point the parents will be blamed for not doing what parents are supposed to do.

Hank Richards, Managing Partner - PRonlineNews.com (guest)
DC:

Bret Baier from FoxNews received tremendous criticism for his intervierview with the President who said 'we are too focused on the process.' Isn't this the same guy who said during his campaign that he was going to 'change the way Washington runs?' Isn't that the same thing as "THE PROCESS?"

Glenn Christie (guest)
GU:

They should have used their super majorities last summer but could not because they could not (and cannot) articulate their real agenda - single payor health care. The Dems were not prepared to lead on this issue when they had the chance to do so. Instead, the Dems in Congress wallowed around and came up with a mess - that is really just one step towards single payor. The failure to be honest with the American people is the real problem here.
P.S. I'm a Canadian - our rich and powerful by-pass our system when it suits them to get better care in the U.S. That said, I like our system for us, because we are not the same as you are. I just wish I had the choice to pay more of my own money for better care (in addition to the crushing tax burden) - but its illegal to do so up here.

Mike G. (guest)
OH:

Mr. Jost, "The Republicans only want power"? Sir, you need to come down from your liberal perch and spend some time with the common man. From where I am sitting it looks like the other way around. The Democrats now own part of two car companies, several banks, passed a huge stimulus bill that has only helped themselves (Government employees) and now they want to control 16% of our economy? Who wants power? I will say it again 16% of our economy and it has been rushed and rammed through with very little concern about us, the peasants. Not sure what you do for a living Mr. Jost but I am pretty sure you are not a small business owner like I am. My biggest obstacle in business is my Government. They are not a partner, though they are paid before I am.

Michael Evans (guest)
MA:

Bi-partisanship: Has there been a single major piece of legislation that took the country in a new direction that did not in the end have bi-partisan support? I suspect not-and for good reason. The government by the people and for the people (Nancy-do those words sound familiar?) means the government leads the country only as far as the people are willing to go. To do other wise invites consequences like elections, and protests and even ultimately revolution if taken too far. Not a good long term survival strategy for the party in power. Bloc voting invites fragmentary parties-again not a good strategy for either major party. Good legislative leaders would have looked around the country and guaged the mood of the people and offered up health care reform that would have had some Republican support. How powerful would Obama looked as a leader if he had said we are going to tackle this problem in stages and here's what we are going to do first? Instead he has looked inexperienced and ineffectual no matter what the outcome of the shameful process that will take place this weekend. Democrats are going to lose the center over this slap in the face to the american people.

Nick Wilson (guest)
TX:

What I don't understand is why, instead of doing the procedural jiujitsu, the House doesn't pass a "brand new bill" which is basically the Senate bill plus the changes they expect the Senate to reconcile. That way, they would be able to develop a bill satisfactory enough to both houses and wouldn't put them in a difficult position legally and politically of explicitly violating the Constitution.

Nick Wilson (guest)
TX:

What I don't understand is why, instead of doing the procedural jiujitsu, the House doesn't pass a "brand new bill" which is basically the Senate bill plus the changes they expect the Senate to reconcile. That way, they would be able to develop a bill satisfactory enough to both houses and wouldn't put them in a difficult position legally and politically of explicitly violating the Constitution.

Eric Dams (guest)
PA:

Democrats need to look at this as a big picture feint, and evidence of the Republican nay-saying for anything. The American people can look over a full years time and see genuine attempts to integrate Republican ideas and concerns into the health care bill in the interest of bi-partisanship. Now, for the rest of the year, and the rest of the President's agenda can be straight party votes, as negotiating with Republicans is obviously not worth anyone's effort. A way to attack that in elections would be to just point out that the incumbent Republican DID ABSOLUTELY NOTHING IN THE PAST YEAR to help you out. Democrats help the little guy, we have enough press for that, and Republicans didn't help the little guy at all, so who were they helping?

Chris Sells (guest)
AL:

What escapes me is the focus on the importance of bipartisanship when bipartisanship leads to the inability to address modern day issues in an effective manner.

Mike Kuzel (guest)
GA:

So who was it that allowed the childish Thomas J. Whalen participate in what is for the most part a debate between adults?
He comes across as a DailyKos'r, and would be better served keeping his ill-informed opinions to himself, thus keeping us from realizing just how juvenile his ponderings really are.

Gary Mitchell (guest)
CO:

Bi-partisanship, or lack of therein, is not the problem for the Democrats. The thing that the pundits are failing to give recognition to, is the fact that the most effective opposition to this monstrocity of a bill have come from the grass roots. The President and the rest of his cronies thought last year that they could hold a bunch of "town hall talking points" and everyone would just fold under the eminence of Obama.
The Dem's justifiably pooh-poohed a weak Repbulican party, but what they failed to recognize is that most Americans like America. We don't want to become European, or Canadian. We are a society that wants the government to exist and function for the people, not vice-versa. The Democrats are struggling to pass Obamacare because the American people are energized behind a common cause, not allowing the transformation of the United States into a socialist state. So Democrats, go ahead and try and ramrod your agenda. The constituency is just getting warmed up. Don't be suprised when this new entitlement is repealed.

Chuck Stickney (guest)
WI:

Bipartisanship? Funny. The gang of six? Please ... could there be a weaker straw man?
In the words of our next president, Paul Ryan - "The only thing bipartisan in his bill is the opposition!"

Kathryn O'Mara (guest)
NY:

I think the Democrats will be more partisan the rest of this term, but I think that is the wrong lesson to take from this. Had the Democrats not abandoned Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins while trying to woo Ben Nelson and Joe Lieberman, they might have passed a bill with a triggered public option. They will never get many Republicans, so they shouldn't try to get most or even many of them on board. But they can get a few.

Jon Davenport (guest)
TX:

If this piece of junk finds passage on Sunday, November will be a bloodbath for one party and I'm betting it is the Dems. The approval ratings for POTUS and the Congress aren't in a free-fall because they haven't passed it.

Jason Yarborough (guest)
SC:

"If you recall, President Obama demanded that health care pass before the congressional recess this past summer. At that time no one knew what was in the bill, or what it cost, except a privileged group of senators, House members and White House officials. Republicans were locked out of the process as were many Democrats."
No I don't recall that at all. There were versions of all the various proposals online and CBO scores flying all over the place. Republicans were adding in literally hundreds of amendments and dozens of them were approved. I expect more intellectual honesty from a professional educator. If you have respect for the validity of your arguments, you shouldn't need to resort to this sort of manipulation.

Sandra Duffy (guest)
NY:

A country with an unwieldy political system like the US needs to forget about bipartisan bargaining . Change is achieved by getting a voter mandate and implementing that mandate. Other western countries don't waste half a government cycle pandering to the opposition. This has been a mistaken strategy and hopefully Obama will learn from this and make the most of his remaining time to achieve a more equal US society.

Phil Gonzalez (guest)
TX:

The one party rule is the government we have now. Let's not pretend the Republicans were listened to on any part of the bill until there was a summit. It was President Obama who said he knows there are going to be philosophical differences, but he's not going to "listen" to failed theories of the Republicans. Bipartisan includes procedures and debates. That's not what President Obama is interested in and he said so in an interview with Fox news. Let's not pretend again, there wasn't a reason the one party rule was created by President Obama. Does fast track passage ring a bell. How about the idea of just up or down votes. No process. With the one party rule that's what President Obama was hoping for and hasn't gotten. Failure to pass the bill hasn't been because of what Hoyer called, a small group of partisans, it's the American people. If Hoyer calls the American people a small group of partisans, no wonder there is so much tone deafness. Pelosi said there's more of this coming. Are we to believe Pelosi said so because of being bipartisan. No, she said so because of the one party rule. It was Pelosi who said we've waited so long to get what we wanted and she couldn't say that with going bipartisan. Neither could President Obama.

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